Middle English Literature

This book provides a boldly original account of Middle English
literature from the Norman Conquest to the beginning of the
sixteenth century. It argues that these centuries are, in
fundamental ways, the momentous period in our literary history, for
they are the long moment in which the category of literature itself
emerged as English writing began to insist, for the first time,
that it floated free of any social reality or function.

This book also charts the complex mechanisms by which English
writing acquired this power in a series of linked close readings of
both canonical and more obscure texts. It encloses those readings
in five compelling accounts of much broader cultural areas,
describing, in particular, the productive relationship of Middle
English writing to medieval technology, insurgency, statecraft and
cultural place, concluding with an in depth account of the
particular arguments, emphases and techniques English writers used
to claim a wholly new jurisdiction for their work.

Both this history and its readings are everywhere informed by
the most exciting developments in recent Middle English scholarship
as well as literary and cultural theory. It serves as an
introduction to all these areas as well as a contribution, in its
own right, to each of them.

"Christopher Cannon's latest book makes one fall in love with
Middle English literature all over again ... a book that - I am
convinced - will endure as one of the most cogent, sophisticated,
and delightful introductions to English medieval literary
history."English

"This is a scintillating cultural history of Middle English
literature, punctuated throughout with critical insights ...
Cannon's succinct and vivid style allows him to introduce striking
bits of philosophical or cultural theory alongside descriptions of
crucial technological innovations ... equipped with its
bibliographical guides and timeline, Medieval English
Literature achieves the enviable aim of providing the student
with both a cultural history and plenty of original literary
commentary."Medium Auvum

"Following in the distinguished footsteps of Derek Pearsall and
James Simpson, Christopher Cannon offers an exhilarating grand tour
of Middle English literature. Cannon’s writing is not just
efficient but also elegant and pithy. His aphorisms condense knotty
arguments and enact complex critical positions with unusual poise
and insight. But underpinning his approach throughout is a
philologist’s ability to listen attentively to the voices of
the pages, to display what Nietzsche called 'the leisurely art of
the goldsmith applied to language'."

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